Hellobee Boards

Moisturize often! We use Vanicream and apply twice a day, once in the morning and once at night right after a bath. If it takes 7 days for the steroid cream to work, you should be able to go 7 days without before using it again if it is working correctly.

For my kids we have to make sure to avoid scratching (breaks the skin and leads to an infection), and I will give them an antihistamine before bed (we use prescription antihistamine similar to Benadryl that makes them a little more drowsy). It helps a lot for LO1 because he is unable to fall asleep due to itchiness or wakes up often throughout the night and scratches. I don't give it to him every night, only on days I notice that his eczema is flaring up and bothering him. We don't bathe every night because soaps will dry out their skin. On bath nights with soap he usually does get a dose since his eczema bothers him the most.

With that being said, I wasn't great about caring for LO1's eczema and wish I had done things differently. It took me a long time to address his skin needs. I tried to find options that were more natural and weary of too much intervention from the doctors. That led to infections and continued stress.

In our case, my kids' eczema is related to their food allergies. I breastfed/pumped for both of them and noticed that cutting out foods helped improve their skin and reduced their other symptoms. It didn't get rid of their eczema by any means, but it helped.

@zeebaby: I was kind of straight forward haha but dairy was the main reason for ds' eczema. We had to use prescription meds to clear it up (not cortisone). And we use earth mama angel baby body wash because nothing else was gentle enough.

Food allergies. Try cutting out dairy and gluten. If that doesn't work you might have to go a full blown elimination diet. That is what worked for us. Turns out the trigger were citrus, eggs, tomatoes and strawberries. After about 10 days on the e diet, eczema was totally cleared. And it was so bad. Makes me cringe when I look back on pictures. We were able to reintroduce those foods when DD was around 18 mo this and she's fine now. We also use pure Shea butter (from Amazon) topically. Better than any special eczema lotion.